For centuries, hand held tools of various types have been used to clean accumulated debris from horses' hooves, and it is well known and commonly accepted to be a task requiring a good deal of user strength and effort. The benefits of regular cleaning of hooves of the equine species--including horses, mules, and the like--are so manifest that the task of cleaning is carried out almost daily without exception. Even so, comparatively little has changed over the years regarding tools and cleaning techniques, and the well-known handle/sharpened-tip tools remain the standard of the craft. Variously shaped cleaning points or picks have been described, and occasionally stiff-bristle brushes have been incorporated into combination-type cleaning tools. Virtually all hoof cleaning tools require a hefty amount of wrist-straining effort to pry out hard-packed material such as mud, manure, straw, ice, and other encrusted debris. While adequate results are generally achieved using the basic pick-type tools, damage to horses' hooves and users' hands is not uncommon.
Descriptions of typical prior art approaches to hand-held tools for cleaning the hooves of horses and methods of their use may be found in a number of U.S. patents.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,367,798 to Sabol discloses a typical contemporary hoof cleaning tool having a conically shaped hook and a trapezoidally shaped scraper disposed in a head end of a contoured handle. A stiff cleaning brush is affixed to the other handle end. The hook and scraper are on opposite sides of the tool head end and the hook is disposed at a 90-degree angle to the longitudinal axis of the handle body.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,636,697 to Pitchford also discloses a hand-held tool for cleaning horses' hooves, and again shows a pick member integrally formed at one end of a handle with the pick disposed at 90 degrees to the longitudinal axis of the handle. In use, the handle is manipulated back and forth with the debris being removed largely via the conventional backstroke pulling motion.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,575,337 to Sapyta discloses a recent (1966) hoof pick having a T-shaped handle that drives an elongated shank with a wedge-shaped tip. A curved hook may also be welded to the shank, and in use the wedge and hook portions are used sequentially by inverting (or flipping over) the handle in the user's hand to bring either tool surface to bear on the debris.
A very early (1896) U.S. Pat. No. 567,493 to MeCartae, discloses a multi-purpose farrier's tool, and not only includes a cleaning pick but also includes a number of auxiliary elements, some of which fold into or swing out at right angles from a handle to produce a multi-function device.
Additional teachings of various types of prior art, hand-held hoof cleaning tools are found in U.S. Pat. No. 5,168,935 to Thornbury et al., as well as in the 1997 Design U.S. Pat. No. D381,474 to Dalton, and the 1983 Design U.S. Pat. No. D270,104 to Jensen.
While each of these prior art cleaning picks function more or less well, they have not to date addressed the basic problem of far-from-optimum orientation of their various elements in order to mitigate the wrist-straining efforts required for their use. It is exactly this need that the present invention admirably meets with its specially configured handle/pick arm arrangement, which greatly enhances the control and power a user can apply via the tool.